I just read this—

https://www.christianpost.com/news/priest-shaken-after-fake-funeral-with-paid-actors.html

I can understand why the pastor stopped the funeral, but it seems like a missed opportunity.

After all, we all have the same eulogy. Why not give it?

Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to mourn a human. All of us live our lives with a certain amount of illusion regarding our autonomy, our choices, and the significance of our individual accomplishments.

In fact, little of that matters and none of it matters after we are gone.

What matters is Who we trusted with our lives. There is only one person in recorded history who can make a difference to a person at the point of death and beyond and that person is Jesus.

Jesus promised us all eternal life

His life for ours

His ransom for our sins.

If you don’t know Jesus and haven’t let him have your questions, doubts, sins, and lies, then ask him now—

Ask him if he is real

Then let his realness change everything.

John 3

Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s willingness to stay in Germany and face Nazi oppression has anchored me when I have faced lesser challenges.

I told myself, if Bonhoeffer could face Hitler, imprisonment, and death, I can face x.

When Navalny returned to Russia, I thought, Bonhoeffer.

I am in mourning. I am angry and deeply grieved. For myself, for my family, for his family, for Russia, and for the world—when men like Navalny are murdered, we all lose light.

Is there anyone now brave enough to replace him?

“Greater love has no man, than he lays down his life for his friend.”

—Jesus

Isaiah 64:1-12 KJV
[1] Oh that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy presence, [2] As when the melting fire burneth, the fire causeth the waters to boil, to make thy name known to thine adversaries, that the nations may tremble at thy presence! [3] When thou didst terrible things which we looked not for, thou camest down, the mountains flowed down at thy presence. [4] For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him. [5] Thou meetest him that rejoiceth and worketh righteousness, those that remember thee in thy ways: behold, thou art wroth; for we have sinned: in those is continuance, and we shall be saved. [6] But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. [7] And there is none that calleth upon thy name, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee: for thou hast hid thy face from us, and hast consumed us, because of our iniquities. [8] But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand. [9] Be not wroth very sore, O Lord, neither remember iniquity for ever: behold, see, we beseech thee, we are all thy people. [10] Thy holy cities are a wilderness, Zion is a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation. [11] Our holy and our beautiful house, where our fathers praised thee, is burned up with fire: and all our pleasant things are laid waste. [12] Wilt thou refrain thyself for these things, O Lord ? wilt thou hold thy peace, and afflict us very sore?

She would be frumpy, unassuming, and decidedly middle aged (like me) and she would be leaving her mid-century modern home around mid-morning to go to the local Safeway.

She would leave the letter on the Formica counter top as a precaution.

She would expect to be back, but

The letter would say this nonetheless—

Dearest,

You have put up with both my chatter and doomsday predictions for so long, so what is one more note on the countertop? Keep this safe until you need it. Read it then.

The world is increasingly fragile and weirdly prophetic scenes have already played out before us—

So

I have left both iodine and chlorine tablets in the medicine cabinet. Plenty of duct tape for the basement windows. There is a small solar panel and battery pack. And I will buy things which can be stored and saved like peanut butter, shelf-stable staples, dried legumes.

Let the trees grow wild. We will need the shade, the fuel, the oxygen.

Wind up flashlight/ wind up radio.

And keep track of the family Bible. I know it is tempting to rely on the phone app, but when disruptions come, you will need a Way through—

The shema. Jesus’ injunction to call on his name to be saved.

Matthew 24:4-8 KJV
[4] And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. [5] For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. [6] And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. [7] For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. [8] All these are the beginning of sorrows.

Jeremiah 29:10-15 KJV
[10] For thus saith the Lord, That after seventy years be accomplished at Babylon I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in causing you to return to this place. [11] For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end. [12] Then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you. [13] And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart. [14] And I will be found of you, saith the Lord : and I will turn away your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places whither I have driven you, saith the Lord ; and I will bring you again into the place whence I caused you to be carried away captive. [15] Because ye have said, The Lord hath raised us up prophets in Babylon;

Yesterday I was reading a news article on my phone when something caught my eye—an ad for a Susbok.

Immediately, I knew I had to have one! The shiny sleekness of it! Its milky grey-silver-mother-shippy allure!

What, you ask, is a Susbok? It is a beautiful fiction. It looks like a sleek futuristic crock pot or wifi extender—maybe both!

But alas, it is only anAI generated picture attached to an ad for 28 other concoctions fabricated by computer intelligence.

I calculate that 4.75 humans will read this post if I am lucky, yet the Susbok is seen by millions.

We need to wake up. We have already exchanged our voices for AI generated nonsense.

The emperor is in the streets even now, naked except for his shiny new Susbok, and maybe 28 other cool gadgets for 2023.